Salt and Sand

 A gentle breeze feathered her skin and the sun was warm on her face. She heard the keening of seagulls up above when she came to. There was something soft underneath her, something grainy. Sand? She could only feel and hear at first, before she managed to open her eyes. The blue above stretched endlessly and the suns glare made it hard to look up for long. Now she saw the seagulls circling overhead.

“Where… am I…?” the girl asked, and made an attempt to prop herself up on her elbows. But when she tried-

“Ah!” she yelped.

A hot white pain surged through her nerves, coming from her right calf. After she nudged her glasses back into place, she saw the reason; a piece of wood pierced through it, a clean skewering. It was shaped like a bolt; was she shot? She couldn’t remember. Her glasses were crooked and a skew, one of their lenses broken. But even glancing through the undamaged lens, her sight was blurry and her head pounding.

She was exhausted, groggy and hurting everywhere. Her head was swimming with dizziness and her throat was dry as a desert. She had trouble keeping her eyes open as instinct pushed her to search for more injuries.

She pulled her tattered, salt-logged dress up and saw cuts and bruises all over herself; it was like she was tossed and thrown across hard ground. Each red line stung, each bruise pounded but all was eclipsed, almost drowned out by the searing throb on her leg.

Staying awake was nigh impossible. Her mind wrestled with her body, every part of her demanding more rest. But she had to take in her surroundings at least. Her arms shook with strain and her gaze swept across the beach. She saw a shoreline, a lagoon and around her pieces of driftwood that once belonged to a ship. And right by her side was a wooden staff; a little waterlogged and sodden with salt but still intact.

Is this mine…? Or was it washed up here by chance?  she thought to herself.

It didn’t matter. Her hand reached for it and she curled her fingers around it. The weight felt familiar, so did the texture. Her body remembered what her addled mind couldn’t.

She was shipwrecked, there was no denying it. But when she tried to search her memories for more but the hammering ache in her head prevented her from delving. Any thought was a chore. She pressed her hand to her temple; that was all she could manage.

Her throat was parched and raw, her belly was aching with hunger and her limbs felt leaden with weakness. Movement was sluggish. And before she knew it, her arms gave away and her head fell to the sandy ground. No matter how hard she tried, consciousness slipped away from her. Her sense of time stopped working. Seconds or hours, she couldn’t tell. Meaning bled away each time she phased in and out of consciousness.

One time she heard footsteps approaching. When she opened her eyes and saw an old man standing above her. His blue eyes were tight with concern and even his fluffy beard couldn’t hide his frown. She couldn’t make more out; his silhouette was swimming in her vision.

The girl could hear him call out, but his voice was drowned out like she was ten meters underwater. She focused her mind and ears, gave him all attention she could muster. And yet for her exhausted mind, it wasn’t enough.

What is he saying? I can’t tell… she thought to herself, unable to decipher what he said before the dark claimed her yet again.

Her consciousness remained fickle as the high seas. She would witness only fractions of the events surrounding her. The ground below felt softer but shaking, the sound of turning wheels accompanying it. Then all faded to black again.

When she came to once more the shaking stopped; so did the sound of wheels turning. She heard two people talking, then the shaking resumed. Her exhausted mind could barely keep up, but is she had to guess, she was being transported; by the old man, no less. Before she could manage any coherent theories, her mind slipped away from her once again and the world returned to silent blackness.